An innovative Australian digital radar built with a series of modified rugby goalposts is attracting worldwide attention.

A consortium led by La Trobe University in Melbourne developed the Tiger-3 digital radar, which is 10 times more sensitive than any other research radar.

Lead researcher Professor John Devlin said the radar would be used to study space weather, which has an impact on navigation and surveillance systems for shipping and aircraft, as well as for GPS systems.

"It measures the ionospheric reflections from a distance out to about 5,000 kilometres," he said.

The radar itself stands in a field near the ocean in Buckland Park, a suburb north of Adelaide, and features wires strung between the modified rugby posts.

Radars were first developed during World War II, but engineer Dr Eddie Custovic said technology had come a long way since then.

"The innovation is largely in new software technology that is used to analyse data and signal processing," he said.

La Trobe University Engineering and Space Physics staff have been working on digital radars since the 1990s, and the Tiger-3 took a team three years to build.

Being digital, the radar can be operated remotely by a computer in Melbourne.

Most radars are still analogue or hybrid, and the digital one offers greater sensitivity, longer range and a much wider field of view, which means researchers are able to detect objects and structures that were not previously visible.

Hardware technology has also improved. For example, the basic building block of all electronics is the transistor, which was invented in 1947.

Back then it was the size of a human palm, but now transistors can be as small as tens of nanometres.

Data measured to study space weather

Digital radars still work on waves, using frequencies of 8-20 MHz in the High Frequency band, but the electronics and signal processing are now entirely digital, meaning the radar is less susceptible to instrumentation noise.

They work by sending small electric pulses into the upper atmosphere, and a signal is then reflected back to Earth.

Researchers measure the data to study space weather, like recent solar flares, which can potentially knock out power, satellites, navigation and surveillance systems for shipping, aircraft and GPS.

The recent solar flares just grazed the Earth, but Dr Custovic said flares had the potential to knock out transformers, potentially shutting off power for weeks.

Daily research will help weather bureaus to make better predictions and guide shipping navigation.

The total cost of the radar is $1.7 million, but the mechanics cost just $150,000, which is cheaper than other digital radars.

The consortium has sold radars to the British Antarctic Survey and the South African Space Agency, and is now in talks with defence forces and universities around the world.

There are currently 33 radars globally being used to study the Earth's ionosphere, and the South Australian apparatus is the most sensitive and only fully digital radar.

Dr Custovic said the radar was so powerful it could replace dozens of other measurement tools.

He said if three or four of radars are built around Australia, "it will provide us with a complete field of view 5,000 kilometres out from the mainland".